World renowned Italian cellist and composer Giovanni Sollima is a Palermo conservatory graduate; he honed his playing skills at Universität Mozarteum Salzburg, as well as at the State University of Music and Performing Arts Stuttgart.

His virtuoso playing helped him conquer world’s greatest concert venues, while few outstanding musicians were his partners on stage. He is not underrated as composer; indeed, he receives commissions from prominent theatre directors and choreographers.

Symphony and chamber music, as well as vocal, choir, and piano music are among the numerous works written by Sollima.

And he always pushes the envelope, working with jazz, rock, electronic music, as well as minimalism and Sicilian and Mediterranean folklore. (Sollima has collaborated with Patti Smith, appearing on her records and performing with her in concert.) Sollima is actually multi-instrumentalist, who always tries to master a new instrument, whether it is some ancient ethnic thing, or modern electronic gadget. He’s the inventor of some of them! In his “normal” classical life, Giovanni Sollima plays ancient cello built by Francesco Rugeri (Cremona, 1679).

Mario Brunello was born in 1960 at Castelfranco Veneto. He made his breakthrough in 1986 as the first and only Italian ever to win the coveted International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. His success was built on studies with Adriano Vendramelli at the Conservatorio di Musica Benedetto Marcello of Venice and with Antonio Janigro. 

As the founder and artistic director of Arte Sella and I Suoni delle Dolomiti festivals, Brunello has invented performances in the high peaks of the Dolomites. 

Brunello’s heartfelt playing has secured engagements with such leading conductors as Antonio Pappano, Valery Gergiev, Yury Temirkanov, Manfred Honeck, Riccardo Chailly, Vladimir Jurowski, Ton Koopman, Riccardo Muti, Daniele Gatti, Myung-Whun Chung and Seiji Ozawa, and concerto performances with many of the world’s foremost ensembles, from the London Philharmonic, London Symphony, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Munich Philharmonic and Philadelphia Orchestras to the NHK Symphony Tokyo, Filarmonica della Scala and Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. 

Brunello has forged fruitful chamber music partnerships with Gidon Kremer, Yury Bashmet, Martha Argerich, Andrea Lucchesini, Frank Peter Zimmermann, Isabelle Faust, Maurizio Pollini and the Hugo Wolf Quartet. 

His all-encompassing artistic passions have generated special projects that cross genres, including collaborations with singer-songwriters Vinicio Capossela, actor Marco Paolini, musicians like Uri Caine and Paolo Fresu.